Never on a Broomstick

by Frank Donovan

Covers the topic of the evolution of witchcraft, from prehistoric rituals, through the Middle Ages, the witch hunt period, and modern practices.
It gives detailed description about the contemporary beliefs we hold against witches.
Donovan is very negative toward Christianity and Judaism.
Donovan criticizes the Church by saying that it was the churchs fault that people turned to witchcraf, because it was too boring for and distant from the people.
So the nocturnal meetings of the witches Sabbat appealed more.
In describing methods of torture used during the witch hunts, Donovan gets very graphic.
The book also covers topics including possession and the control of natural phenomenon and weather.

Annotation by Joseph Zubko.

Genres: Nonfiction, History, Witchcraft

256 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1971

Reviews

[Mónica Cordero Thomson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Tradicionalmente vemos, leemos, estudiamos y disfrutamos de la Historia de una manera cronológica y muy amplia, fijándonos en los sucesos más relevantes, en sus causas y consecuencias. Pero también conviene estudiar esa misma Historia desde diferentes puntos del prisma; desde diferentes temáticas. Y eso es lo que hace este libro: la historia de la brujería desde la antigüedad hasta ya entrada la Edad Moderna.
A través de esta temática, también podemos rastrear parte de la historia de la mujer y de la evolución de la mentalidad y de los prejuicios.
Se aprende mucho de una manera muy amena.

[Brett Dulle · Rating 2 out of 5]

Never on a Broomstick is a history of witchcraft aimed at the hippie crowd. The basic thesis of the book is that witchcraft represents a survival of pagan fertility cults in the Christian era. It's not a very scholarly book which is a problem because it's also a revisionist history. The book reverses the standard view of the Medieval era as a time of great piety. The book claims that outside the cities the vast majority of people were only quasi-Christian and that parish priests would still say prayers to old pagan gods. The Church is depicted as a almost totally corrupt institution that persecuted witches largely to stamp out paganism and to get their hands on the property of executed witches. One problem here is that the book has not notation system and the author only occasionally names the author or book where some information came from. The book is organized topically and the author will jump from England in the 14th century to France in the 17th. The problem here is that the author acknowledges there were great differences between countries in the behaviors of the witches and how the witch trials were prosecuted. There is another major issue with this book. While the author does not believe in the supernatural it seems as if he believes these witch cults really did exist and yet he acknowledges that most of the testimony from the witch trials came from torture induced confessions and is thus untrustworthy. The problem here is that "unreliable" witch trial testimony is his main source of information about witchcraft before the modern era.
These problems aside the book can be enjoyed as a sort of anecdotal history- interesting stories about witches and witchcraft- it gets repetitive due to it's heavy emphasis on the sexual elements of witchcraft. This is why I say it's aimed at the hippie crowd. The book depicts the witches' sabbath as a drunken orgy. There are many stories of women having sex with the devil, demons (incubi), animals, and of course, other humans. The Church is naturally depicted as wholly venal and hypocritical since the book includes tales of church officials own sex scandals. At one point the author states that parish priests would regularly seduce parishioners. Interestingly enough the author deemphasizes but does not completely obscure the darker elements of witchcraft. There are stories of witches using magic to kill sometimes acting as a medieval hit squad, apparently some nobleman hired a coven to kill King James I, for instance. There are also a few gruesome tales of child sacrifices. The author explicitly states that is very likely that some child sacrifice probably did happen. It's a decent primer but I can't help but feel there's a better book on the topic especially considering how expensive this book is now.

[Deirdre · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hechos, sucesos, historias.

No es una novela, no es fantasía. Aquí se cuentan historias de oídas (del boca a boca) de la época de la persecución que sí sucedieron, algunas de las cuales sí se documentaron.

Es un estudio sobre lo que significó esa época, donde una peca de más en la piel era la diferencia entre ser señalada (y culpable) a no serlo y su posterior enjuiciamiento.

Se cuentan las torturas para extraer confesiones, que no eran confesiones, sino hablar por hablar para dejar de ser torturadas, admitir cualquier hecho para que parasen de infligirles daño aunque supusiera su muerte posterior.

Se habla de supuestos hechizos, de reuniones secretas, de objetos asociados a supuestas prácticas entre las practicantes de la brujería. Es un libro pequeño, pero abarca todos esos aspectos.

Esta edición contiene ilustraciones antiguas, grabados referentes a ese mundo, muy interesantes.

Como lectura para conocer de una forma didáctica lo que implicó la brujería y sus consecuencias es muy recomendable.

[Joseph F. · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fun accessible book that has a little bit of everything: what witches did (or believed to have done), what they do today, and the history and development of the witch hysteria. For those of us with morbid curiosities, it has many ghoulish details concerning torture procedures and strange accounts of possession and bewitchment. However,the book is a bit outdated in places and has no notes nor index.

[Tyree · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really liked some aspects of this book, but it's reeeally outdated. the claims that "all witches believe x" is just wrong, and the claims (based on Margaret Murray's work) that the victims of the witch craze actually were witches and went to huge sabbats, or that there was ANY truth to their accuser's claims, is pretty damn offensive. it was written in the 70s though, so I guess it's a product of its time...

[Steve Clark]

Edition: First UK Edition